Daydreamin' in the sun

 

 

 

It's one of those beautiful early summer days, when the breeze still qualifies as a breeze (not the low-setting on a blow dryer) and the heat seems cozy. My beloved roses are threatening to burst open their buds any moment now and that makes me so happy, the air is thick with nature's anticipation for a season of heavy growth and under the weight of it all we feel momentarily slow and lazy.

My to-do list has a brief interlude and Gus is lazying on the Subaru's windshield, while I drink an iced coffee on the front porch steps. I'm thinking it's naptime, but then again he is so happy just day dreaming there, watching the clouds and telling me about Thomas-the-Train's latest exploits...

We are working on "look at Momma and say hi" when I point the camera at him, so I wanted to share the results. Gus' smile is worth millions in cold hard cash but really it's priceless to me. Even if eye contact remains a hurdle, his smile and friendly manners make up for it any day.

Short One

Just a brief note to tell everyone who has called, texted or commented, how much I appreciate all the thoughtful support and assurances....yes, the world must be populated with diaper-wearing 4 and 5-year-old boys and maybe mine will join their ranks (he'll be general if it's an army-sort-of-effort) and they'll march against potty-obsessed Mommas like me.

I really appreciate it - very much. I'm facing every day with a little more resolve and a little less inurity (not sure if that is a word...too lazy to look it up, too, shoot me you little diaper-guerrilla soldiers) there are faint signs of hope. The fact that he hates having it in his undies, the fact that he is genuinly sorry to make it in his undies, the fact that he can reliably tell you every step to get a toy reward...

It might be a long haul, but knowing myself, I will learn something from it, gain a bit of humility (which I need lots of) and make lots of funny stories out of it later...maybe to prop up another mom devastated by a son who won't do what she wants him to do....

Give it forward and make life more meaningful together.

Worse Before It Gets Better?

I feel inured these days.
Very inured.
Before you run to grab your dictionary, allow me to show off a bit (after all, my GRE studies seem to be the only effort of mine paying off with tangible results these days)

Inured means "to readily accept the undesirable"

Funny how cloes it seems to the word "injured", which would describe my pride, after a solid week of being met by long faces when I pick Gus up from preschool and leaving with a knotted plastic grocery bag full of smelly, sodden underwear and pants).

Some tell me they feel sorry for me, others venture out on a dangerously thin limb to tell me that it "gets worse before it gets better," still others tell me of the many, many boys they know first, second, third or some-suspicious-number -hand, who were well into their fourth year of life before they would poop on the potty.

I'm not buying it. My friends are all secretive about their boys' toilet exploits and I appreciate how nice they are trying to be, however, I'm simply close to despair over this whole thing. If there are so many boys not going to the potty at four, where are they? Not at Gus' preschool, I can assure you of that.

I feel inured. Though I still question plenty. Like why does this have to be so hard, and will everything be so hard?...and if so, how is that fair?

I've tried it all, I'm tired of it all. I can't think of anything else to do. Did I mention I'm tired?
All my puissance of conviction that with hard work I will see results has left me.
Now go look that up.

Day 7 - Poopie Training

No photo...sorry...can't think of what to take a picture of, since I'm not photographing poop anymore...I was toying with putting my tomato starts here, but that wouldn't really fit with the theme of this post...unless you consider how fickle they are...

No poopie in the potty today. Sorry. I so wish I could end this week on a high note and pump my fist in victory, but no siree, Gus is not playing along. He decided to go in his undies this morning and we plain let him and then let him squirm a bit, enjoying his ginger gait and repeated pleas to be cleaned up. If nothing else a bump in your undies is funny to look at when you are not quite 4 yet.

After a whole week, I can safely say Gus is not completely on my page yet and God has a slighly different plan for me too, so I'm going to work on my patience and humility without giving in.

I believe my plan is a good plan and eventually it will work with some preserverance. There is a bit of fine-tuning I have to do and my professional team will help me with that this coming week. Jacob and I both believe that it is important that we continue, so the diapers stay bye-bye and the added load of laundry is here to stay for a bit longer.

For now I will suspend the daily updates, unless I think I have something interesting to say or some exciting news to report. Talking that much poop without some development just plain isn't good for me or you.

Thanks for hanging in there with me. I hope you were entertained or even learned something.

Day 6 - Poopie Training

There's still another day and maybe it's too early to call this week a complete waste of time and a study in missed opportunities, but it certainly feels that way.

Gus - smart and cunning as he is cute and sweet - has firmly put me back not just on square one but seemingly beyond the starting line alltogether.

So far this week: I've forgotten all my GRE words, all I know now is poopie and potty related terms. I've laundered a load of smelly laundry almost every day. I've managed to clean nothing, straighten up little and simply watch the soap residue accumulate in the bathroom sink (I've lots of time to watch anything in the bathroom sink). I've lost sleep, showered once and at least (Thank God) excercised four times for an hour each time. I would not be sane if I hadn't. I've spent endless hours watching Gus' behind for any suspicious movement, schlepped him off to sit on the potty more times than I want to admit, all with little to show for.

Gus on the other hand, has enjoyed wearing next to nothing almost all days. Poop in new adventurous locations (the front yard today) and aquire a definite distaste for the potty and anything related to it. In fact, his mind is pretty much made up after this week. He doesn't like sitting on it, being near it or talking about it.

Wow, and we stayed home for all that.
On the bright side, he did poop in the potty once and has stayed dry four out of six nights. I try to be grateful. I try. I try. I try.

Poopie Score:
Undies: 3
Potty: 1
Front Yard/Livingroom Floor: 2

Day 5 - Poopie Training

It's just like Gus to firmly place me back on square one, after a brief moment of elation way back on Wednesday and the belief that I had whittled the "squirmy hours" down to a three-hour period in the early afternoon.
Today, we started the day off with a big No. 2 - in the undies. It came totally unexpected early in the morning and was preceeded by little squirming or any other giveaway signs that I could have noticed had I even suspected that something was going on...
Oh well that pretty much clears the day for pursuits other than the potty kind, though we practiced sitting on the potty every two hours, but only for brief periods.
Meanwhile I watch the week go by and wonder what piece I am missing or what I am saying/doing wrong. I have no doubt in my mind that Gus is physically and mentally capable of doing what I want him to do. He has a visual schedule that he can recite by heart, a regular meal plan, enough Metamusil to be regular beyond regular, and pretty much no reason to be scared or anxious, although he now has moved on to some pretty impressive screaming and hitting tantrums every time I tell him it is time to go sit on the potty.
So I am left to wonder if I'm not properly desensitizing him to the potty, or even creating anxiety in him where I shouldn't. Is his diet not fiberous enough? Should I be prompting him to go or let him decide on his own? Should or shouldn't I adjust his schedule to try to get him to go at a predictable time, or should I just wing it, which means walking on eggshells all day. One of our professional helpers is suggesting that I treat accidents with a noticeably detached, neutral demeanor (showing now disappointment or desperation, which God know I am feeling) so that Gus does not learn to get attention from me by doing the wrong thing.
Whichever way you turn it it this potty training experiment fraught with moving targets and accidental mistakes, and almost everything else is left open to interpretation.
We'll forge on.
I have laundry to do.

Day 4 - Poopie Training

No picture today. Not sure what I would take a picture of anyway, other than my growing pile of smelly laundry, which I'm currently washing.

I knew there was going to be a low point in this undertaking, but after yesterday's poopie in the potty, I was hoping (and praying) that it was already behind us...not so.

Today I'm feeling very low on top of feeling a fair amount of self-loathing.

Flying high after yesterday's score on the Potty side, I decided to treat myself to going to bookclub and sit for two hours and talk with girlfriends about a book, instead of staring at Gus' behind and talking about Poopoo and peepee.

It felt great, but I immediately regretted it after coming home to the news that Gus had yet again managed to poop another load into his undies while Daddy wasn't watching.

On top of that, Gus didn't stay dry throgh the night, although I think he awoke from the need to pee this morning and quickly got up to fetch me, but he had already wetted his pyjamas as well as his pillow (how to you launder a pillow?)

To make matters worse (at least in my poopie obsessed mind) Gus squirmed around all afternoon - from 2 to almost 4 p.m. - while I followed him around like a love-sick puppie, only to end up planting a poopie on our livingroom carpet, while I snuck a 5-minute look at my e-mail.

Damn computer.

I'm trying hard to not feel frustrated about all this right now, but I do feel like I'm not gaining the upper hand and Gus is simply getting better at waiting for his moment, instead of figuring out how to sit on the potty and get his business done.

Yikes.

So we'll forge on. I'm already getting friendly with the idea that this poopie immersion thing will continue into a second week (I might keep him home from preschool or we might try to go on without diapers, while he goes to school, I'll figure out the details by Sunday) and I'm not extatic about that.
Deep inside I was hoping that Gus is ready, is smart enough and wants to do this, but maybe I'm just kidding myself.

As for the Autism bit of this, there are plenty of horror stories out there of boys (and girls) who are still in diapers at 9, 11 or even later in life. I'm so determined to make sure Gus stays within an acceptable timeframe and does not go to kindergarten in a diaper.
He will have enough to overcome once he goes to school - I can't bare the thought that diapers will set him even further apart from everyone else.

Can you tell I'm down on myself right now? What was I gaining by checking my e-mail? Well, spending two aimless hours (not in play mind you) circling around 2 seconds with one toy or activity or another is tiresome, and I was simply looking for a bit of distraction.

And distraction I got. From now on I'm only texting, making and taking calls, and spending time on the computer when Gus is down for his nap. I'm not giving him another split-second to do his sneaky thing.

Poopie Score:
Undies:4
Potty:1